Billionaires grow in number and wealth

It was a very good year for billionaires, according to the latest Forbes.com list of people who measure their wealth in 10 figures.

There are a record 1,426 billionaires globally, up 16% from 1,226 last year, and their average net worth rose to $3.8 billion from $3.7 billion. Added together, Forbes.com says, the total net worth for this year's billionaires is $5.4 trillion, up 17% from $4.6 trillion last year. The United States leads the list, with 442 billionaires, followed by Asia-Pacific (386) and Europe (366).

This year, 210 billionaires are new to the list, while 60 dropped off.

Ohio lists only three billionaires: retail magnate Leslie Wexner of Columbus, at No. 276 on the list with a fortune of $4.5 billion; Dayton's Clayton Mathile, who built a pet food empire that made him worth $1.9 billion, No. 792 on the list; and Denise DeBartolo York of Youngstown, who has a fortune worth $1.1 billion, good for No. 1,268 on the list, stemming from her real estate holdings.

Cleveland sports team owners Dan Gilbert (No. 348 on the list, worth $3.5 billion) and Jimmy Haslam (No. 831, worth $1.8 billion) are listed in their home states of Michigan and Tennessee, respectively.

The world's richest person, one again, is Carlos Slim Helu of Mexico, who is worth $73 billion.

No. 2 on the list, and the richest American, is Bill Gates, whose fortune is at $67 billion.

Has Cuyahoga County been able to get past its corruption problems?

“Civic leaders say while it's too soon to render a final verdict, they are more confident about the region's direction and an improving business climate,” Bloomberg writes in a long analysis of changes that have taken place during the administration of County Executive Ed FitzGerald.

Mr. FitzGerald, 44, a Democrat who might run for governor next year, tells Bloomberg that local business leaders played a key role by volunteering to help update or consolidate county functions. The county has a net 589 fewer employees after more than 975 retired, quit or were fired in what he called an effort to dismantle a “political patronage machine,” according to the news service.

One business leader, Eaton Corp. CEO Sandy Cutler, likes the direction in which things are going.

“While there is still work to be done to enhance job creation, improve education, and develop a more efficient system of government, we have made considerable progress,” Mr. Cutler told Bloomberg via email. (He pushed for the new county charter and served on a transition committee that reviewed county operations.)

Stuart Garson, a Cleveland lawyer who replaced the now-jailed Jimmy Dimora as county Democratic Party chairman, says the changes have lessened the chances for dysfunction.

“The potential for mischief is always there, but it's so much more difficult now,” he said.

Site Selection magazine gives its 2012 Governor's Cup — an award bestowed to the governor of the state with the highest number of qualified capital investment projects in the calendar year — to Texas, which bounced back from a loss to Ohio in 2012.

And it did it in a big way. Texas had 761 qualified projects in 2012, which was 270 more than runner-up Ohio's 491 projects. Pennsylvania kept its third-place finish (430); Michigan (337) and Illinois (322) round out the top five.

Texas' victory was driven by five industries: energy, chemicals, machinery manufacturing, professional services and data centers.

With tax season upon us, MarketWatch.com looks at a report from the Office of Revenue Analysis of the Government to review the estimated property, sales, auto and income taxes a family paid in 2011 in the largest city in each state.

The third-highest tax burden among those big cities? Columbus, which doesn't comport with general notions of Ohio's fastest-growing big city.

Here's how MarketWatch.com summarizes the tax situation in Columbus:

Taxes for family earning $25,000: $3,369 (12th highest)

Taxes for family earning $150,000: $18,241 (4th highest)

Unemployment rate: 6.5% (23rd lowest)

Columbus residents are hit by the one-two punch of sales and property taxes that are higher than most. For instance, a family of three earning $50,000 in 2011 had to fork over $2,116.50 in income taxes and had to pay an additional $4,025 in property taxes. The income tax burden was higher than all but four cities, while the property tax burden was higher than all but five. Not all is bad, though. The sales tax and auto tax burden across all incomes were in the lower half of cities reviewed.